


It Just Takes Some Time

by Lt_Cmdr_Scribbler



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Episode: s01e07 Eye of the Needle, Existentialism, Gen, Light Angst, mild existential crisis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 02:49:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10504875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lt_Cmdr_Scribbler/pseuds/Lt_Cmdr_Scribbler
Summary: “I've become accustomed to being treated like a hypospray.” The Doctor considers just how true and yet untrue the phrase is.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for a mini-project and thought I'd share it with you all.
> 
> Title taken from "The Middle" by Jimmy Eat World.

The Doctor firmly believed that one more lap around Sickbay would surely cause him to lose his mind. While the interior decorating wasn't hideous, staring at the same walls and floor and ceiling for literally all of his life grew excruciatingly boring. Once again, a crew member had forgotten to deactivate him after an appointment, and without autonomy, The Doctor was left online until the next Starfleet employee walked into his Sickbay.

After walking the length of Sickbay for the 211th time, (as a hologram, The Doctor couldn't lose count,) he sat down on one of the biobeds. His feet didn't hurt, since he was not programmed to experience pain, but the change in position was refreshing. He had never actually thought of sitting on the biobeds before, since that was where patients sat when they needed treatment, and a new experience, no matter how minor, incrementally relieved the boredom.

One of his memory files came to the surface of his thoughts: during one of his prouder moments instructing Kes, she had witnessed the rude behaviour typical of _Voyager_ ’s crewmembers toward him.

“You mean others act that way too,” she had said, disbelief and outrage colouring her voice.

“Let’s just say I’ve become accustomed to being treated like a hypospray,” The Doctor had replied with the driest tone he could muster, as if he paid the microaggressions no mind at all.

A hypospray sat on the equipment cart in the middle of the room. The Doctor stood, walked over, and picked up the hypospray. He turned it over in his hands a few times, watching the white light glint off the matte metal alloy of the device.

For most cultures, the invention of the hypospray was a miraculous relief. The previous methods of injection all hinged on being impaled with long needles, and unsurprisingly, a hefty percentage of sentient humanoids were rather averse to that kind of treatment. The hypospray allowed for near-painless injections, and would only cause discomfort if handled extraordinarily roughly by the attending doctor or nurse. Over the three hundred years since its initial invention, it developed into the perfect injection device, leaving only the faintest of marks from where the jet broke the skin.

As an inanimate object, a hypospray couldn't explain what it was doing in layman’s terms. It couldn't offer a patient assurance of any quality. It couldn't teach, couldn't grow bored, couldn't have an existential crisis.

The Doctor firmly placed the hypospray on the cart, effectively shutting the issue out of his mind. Now, Lieutenant Hargrove had came in with some kind of flu, and if the entire Engineering division caught it from him, The Doctor would have not only the Captain breathing down his neck, but an angry half-Klingon on his hands...


End file.
